Without careful eyes and fact checkers, who knows how long we, the masses, would have been in the dark.
I first saw the Martin Luther King, Jr. misquote on a friend’s Facebook page. With regard to Osama Bin Laden’s death, it read, “I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy.” Turns out, Martin Luther King didn’t say this at all. That bit was actually written by Jessica Dovey, a Penn State graduate living in Japan. Shortly after Bin Laden’s death was announced, Dovey posted this as her Facebook status:
I will mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy. "Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that." MLK Jr.
Somewhere in the Internet ether, the quotation marks got lost and the distinction between Dovey’s own thoughts and those of MLK (from his 1963 book Strength to Love) vanished altogether.
The same sort of thing happened to a quote from Mark Twain. No, check that: It was a quote from American lawyer and ACLU leader Clarence Darrow and just attributed to Mark Twain. The Internet version read, “I’ve never wished a man dead, but I have read some obituaries with great pleasure.” And while Twain allegedly said something in a similar vein (“I didn’t attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it”), Darrow’s comment—”I have never killed any one, but I have read some obituary notices with great satisfaction”—hit closer to what actually proliferated on the Internet.
The errors were finally reported by those who were smart and concerned enough to question the “facts.” Though I didn’t repost either misquote, I also didn’t stop to think long enough about whether or not they were accurate. I simply accepted them as truth and went on with my day—as did, apparently millions of others around the world.
And that frightens me a bit.
As we jokingly say in the office, “If it’s on the Internet, it must be true.” But it seems more and more people are slowly forgetting that this is just a joke. Not with big, headlining issues, perhaps, but certainly with little things such as quotes and bits of supporting information that can get lost in the deluge of facts we’re hit by every day. And then, in our 21st-century haste, we post or repost erroneously for the world to partake of our misinformation.
Word of mouth has surely been part of life since people have been on the planet. But the Internet has taken what was once spread slowly and rocketed it out in blinding speed to the entire universe. These misquotes aren’t the end of the world, but they are a small reminder of our need to be more skeptical.
You can quote me, if you like.
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